Uppity Wisconsin

Last week the righty side of the blogosphere was in full wounded mode, stung by accusations they were too quick to throw the "thug" word at Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors Chairman Lee Holloway.

I said race had a lot to do with that, and the righty bloggers said that was thuggish, because they use the word in plenty of situations where race isn't a factor.

I was expecting that they'd have jumped on the outrageous story in these parts a few days ago, when a pair of area men admitted targeting 20 Indian-owned businesses, like gas stations, robbing them and throwing hot coffee in some of the employee and owners' faces.

I thought for sure I'd see righty bloggers happy to call these arrested perpetrators "thuggish," in sort of a nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah way, proving the bloggers were truly equal-oppportunity thug labelers - - since they can spot a thug when they see it - - and I was oh-so-wrong.

So far, I see no posts on the righteously offended righty bloggers' sites about behavior that really looks thuggish, aina?

A whole lot worse than the instances where Holloway acted badly, but not criminally. 

The Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce spent heavily to get State Supreme Court Justice Annette Ziegler elected, then helped finance a major tax in which Ziegler wrote the Court's pro-WMC, 4-3 ruling.

The case blows a $265 million hole in the state budget: who do you think will make up the shortfall?

Wisconsin needs to more assertively use its drunk driving laws to protect the innocent rather than enabling repeat offenders.

It has to treat repeat OWI offenders the same way it deals with people who discharge firearms in public without regard for other people's safety: Lock 'em up and don't give their gun back.

It's a three-step reform of OWI laws, tougher than what is proposed by some legislators:

1. Criminalize a first offense, making it a misdemeanor, and no longer a ticket. Treat that first offense seriously. And make it clear that when it comes to OWI, two strikes and you're out.

2. Turn a second offense into a felony and make vehicle confiscation mandatory. That's how you help a repeat offender see sobriety as desirable and also how you profoundly help deter others from a first or second offense.

3. Turn one or two vehicle confiscations every month or so into very public salvage yard crushings, then auction off the other seized vehicles and turn the proceeds over to law enforcement to help finance equipment purchases, or operating expenses of check points and other anti-OWN actions.

Even this winter's heavy snows did not bring the Great Lakes back to their historic average depths, as a warming climate increases evaporation.

Lower lake levels mean navigation troubles and lighter, less-profitable loads for shippers, heightening the need for coordinated efforts to maintain the waters' quality and quantity.

And despite the growing awareness across the region, and certainly worldwide, that all water is absolutely precious, radical Republicans carrying political water for business interests in Waukesha County, with allies in the conservative fringes in the Ohio legislature, are blocking an eight-state water conservation agreement for Great Lakes management.

What they want are Great Lakes diversions with few standards and controls, even though four of the eight Great Lakes staes have approved the agreement - - known as the Great Lakes Compact - - and further delay could easily kill it.

Details here.

Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk talked sense to Madison's Downtown Rotary on the subject of alcohol abuse.

Details here.

Waukesha County GOP legislative leaders act out, and act badly, when a bi-partisan water conservation measure doesn't go their way in the State Senate.

Since one of their major complaints is that the measure jeopardizes their sense of sovereignty, perhaps they should consider seceding from Wisconsin, and setting up the 51st state, Exceptionalonia, just for special people.  

Two states have fully-approved The Great Lakes compact, two more states' legislatures have passed it and bills are on their Governors' desks, so with four states left to finish off this seven-year process, what is happening in Wisconsin?

On Thursday, the day a bill finally was produced for legislators at the State Capitol for an informational hearing, Assembly Republican leaders announced they wanted the whole package sent back to the eight Great Lakes states for more negotiating.

In other words, death by tabling.

Now there's regional cooperation and bi-partisanship for you, and also some dangerous messing around with the Great Lakes for narrow and partisan purposes.

Details here.

When you don't like an agreement, see if you can change the wording after all parties signed on, and also agreed to making no major changes.

That's what Waukesha wants to do with the eight-state Great Lakes Compact - - toss out its major decision-making standard.

That's so Waukesha can get more water, or so it thinks.

Similar thing happening in Georgia.

Legislators there want to change the boundary with Tennessee, so Tennessee water becomes Georgia water.

If these jurisdictions were talking conservation and sustainable planning and development, none of these tricks would even be open for discussion.

Details here.

Wisconsin needs a statewide smoking ban, or risks being the region's ashtray, says Gov. Doyle.

He's right.

Wisconsin business leaders keep undermining the Great Lakes Compact, since it hasn't been written solely with their narrow interests in mind.

Public citizens they are not, as Yoda might phrase it.

Details here.

So a bank takes a widow's life savings - - because it can. How do you feel about this story, and let's use it as a test of whether you have Empathy Deficit Disorder, or EDD.